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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22979506">a violent end</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/set3/pseuds/set3'>set3</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>All For The Game - Nora Sakavic, They Both Die at the End - Adam Silvera</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>About to Die, Alternate Universe - No Exy (All For The Game), Bonding, Bucket List, Character Death, Confessions, Death-Cast, Depression, Fluff and Angst, Goodbyes, M/M, Self-Acceptance, Self-Discovery, Strangers to Lovers, dont b put off by the death tags, short chapters but like a lot of chapters ukno</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-03-21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-03-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 16:29:14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,378</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22979506</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/set3/pseuds/set3</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Andrew and Neil are total strangers, strangers that just so happen to be dying today. With the knowledge of their imminent death — thanks to the ever knowing force that is Death-Cast calling them — they set out to find a last friend on their last day. With one another’s help, they may be able to live out their entire lifetime in a single day</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Neil Josten/Andrew Minyard</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>29</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. 12:04 — andrew</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p><strong>It is 12:04 when Andrew gets the call.</strong> The cigarette in his hand is burnt down to the filter and scorches his fingers and the ash has long since fallen onto his black jeans but this does not matter, because Death-Cast are calling him. And Andrew Minyard is going to die today.</p><p>          And it’s a taunting ring, not somber and not upbeat, this song on its would would not be scary in the slightest but the sound seems to hollow Andrew out. In an instant, it’s like he’s been drained of his blood, organs scooped up and dropped off some cliff, his hearts on the street he staring at, about to be mowed over by a white van speeding past. His bones have been taken from him, and someones come around with a sledgehammer to pound them to dust in front of his very eyes. All that’s left in his body are veins and arteries, but they’ve all been set alight and he feels the fire running through his fingers — or maybe that cigarettes still burning. </p><p>          Not wanting Aaron or Matt or god forbid Nicky to wake to the sound of Death-Cast’s humbling chimes, he swings his lower body out of the window and lands squarely on the fire escape, closing the window to behind him. It takes every ounce of strength to answer the phone and Andrew feels exhausted by the time he hears a voice on the other end.   </p><p>          “Hello, I’m calling from Death-Cast. I’m Jessica, is this Andrew Minyard?”</p><p>          Death-Cast is dangerous, he thinks as he drags another cigarette from the packet with shaking hands, it’s dangerous and it’s ruthless and it has no mercy. Death-Cast is a service, freely providing people with the knowledge that they’ll die within the next twenty-four hours. Every night at Midnight, the heralds start their job. Heralds are the people that make the calls to Deckers, and Decker is the name for those unfortunate souls that are due to die. The calls carry on until three in the morning and a quick glance at his watch tells Andrew that he’s one of the first calls tonight, he doesn’t know whether that should make him feel better or worse. </p><p>          “Yeah, that’s me.”</p><p>          “<em>Perfect</em>- Well Andrew, I regret to inform you that sometime in the next twenty four hours you’ll be meeting an untimely death. And while there isn’t anything we can do to suspend that, you still have a chance to live.” Jessica doesn’t sound very broken up over Andrew’s future death, which strangely enough, Andrews happy about. He’d hate to get pity off a herald, especially fake pity, it’d make this all a thousand times worse. </p><p>          Jessica goes on to tell Andrew some bullshit about life not always being fair and oh Andrew realises why this is over the phone, because if Jessica had come to his door telling him all this he wouldn’t have hesitated punching her. His laugh rings out bitter and Jessica pauses her recount in activities nearby that he could participate in today. “No, no, go on.” Andrew tells her, and Jessica begins to read from whatever script she’s memorised again. </p><p>          “Do you understand all of this, and understand what is happening?”</p><p>          Inhale, exhale. “Yes.” </p><p>           “Good, good. If you log onto Death-Cast.com and fill out any special requests you may have for your funeral in addition to the inscription you’d like on your headstone. Or perhaps you’d like to be cremated,”</p><p>          Andrew holds his half smoked cigarette in front of his face, he can hear Nicky’s voice echoing in his ears, telling him that’s how he’s gonna die, smoking those cancer sticks. It’s a little funny to him now, and he thinks that he might go through a couple packs today. Tonight. Over the remaining hours of his life. Maybe cigarettes will aid in ending his life, maybe Andrew will cross a road to a corner shop and get plowed down by some idiot going 50 in a 30mph zone. Nicky would be right, kind of. </p><p>          Thinking about how he’s going to die is such a morbid thought, but it’s not like he’s never thought of it before. Andrew’s been waiting for this phone call for years, not quite dreading it but expecting it to pop up when he least expected it. Death-Cast didn’t disappoint him. He hadn’t thought about them in around a month and a half, not since he and Aaron had arrived at their new halfway house. </p><p>          When Andrew tunes back in to Jessica’s voice she’s still talking about funerals, and Andrew spares a thought for what his funeral would be like. Aaron, Kevin, Nicky, and Andrews dead body. Perhaps the other fuckups from the Foxhole - his halfway house - would turn up also. Allison, Matt, Dan, Renee, Seth might even give Andrew the gift of his presence one final time, even if just to spit on his grave. Katelyn, Aarons girlfriend might come just to support Aaron, Andrew’s therapist might come as a courtesy call, Wymack, who is in charge of the halfway house, may even possibly come. A small affair, he doubts anyone but Nicky would have nice words to say.</p><p>          Getting cremated would be better than being buried, Andrew was always a monster born of fire and brimstone, he shouldn’t be buried under an Earth that was never his, under dirt that never wanted him. The flames would burn him kindly, showing him one last act of familiar destruction before he made it to whatever next plane of existence there was. But then came the deciding issue or his ashes, and who would be saddled with the heavy task of carrying them around. </p><p>          “And Andrew, on behalf of everyone here at Death-Cast, we are so sorry to lose you. Live this day to the fullest, okay?” </p><p>          Andrew hangs up. </p><p>          And for some reason, his first instinct is to clean his room. Clean out his belongings and hoover the floors.</p><p>          Something about not wanting to leave a lasting memory behind he guesses, not wanting to leave a mess in his wake. The thought of Aaron walking in tomorrow and seeing Andrew’s t-shirts poking out from under the bunk bed and mourning him at that sight just seems sickening. </p><p>          Andrew runs his finger over the bands the cover his arms, what was he going to do with these? With the blades hidden in the sheaths. </p><p>          He's thinking too many thoughts at once and half formed ideas and thoughts and just everything is flying round him, it’s like he’s downed his entire stash of liquor at once. Alcohol stands out in his mind, and he throws his cigarette down and jumps through the window as quietly as his can. His foot almost catches on the window and he’s scared for a second that he’s going to land headfirst on the floor and knock himself out forever, but he catches himself in time. </p><p>          With his heart beating out of his chest, Andrew welcomes the amber liquid that burns his throat in such a familiar way.  </p><p>          Andrew stands in his room in the dark and cradles his bottle of whiskey and he is going to die in the next twenty four hours. </p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. 12:21 — Neil</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>hi this is bad and neils characters a bit all over the place lets call it a stylistic choice</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p><strong>Neil is dreaming when he hears Death-Cast ringing. </strong>He’s on a beach, and the world is crumbling around him. The floor is falling and the ocean waves are melting into a black void, a complete nothingness. Every semblance of the world is leaving him alone, apart from the burnt bones of his mother that hang heavy in the backpack he wears. </p><p>          His knees are wet from kneeling on what was once wet sand (now its blank, there’s nothing there and Neils not so sure he’s not falling through space right now.) and his face is frozen.</p><p>          Neil knows this is a dream, because he’s looking down at his hands and theres thirteen fingers in total, and Neil doesn’t <em>have</em> thirteen fingers usually, so this has to be a dream. And he’s had these types of dreams fairly often, the ones he has that’re sent from his mother in whatever afterlife space she resides in, dreams made to overcome him with grief, dreams made to reteach him everything his mother once ingrained in his mind while they were on the run. </p><p>          But this music is new, a nice touch, he thinks. It really adds to the large chunk of his soul being scooped up and burnt to smithereens alongside the car wreck they left on the side of the road. </p><p>          Neil can remember the day his mother got the call, the look of pure shock — she had argued with the herald. Told Death-Cast that they were wrong, that she was not going to die, not now not ever. She had insisted they carry on moving, Neil had wanted to slow down for a few hours, reassess the situation, of course if they did that they could’ve been caught by The Butchers people, but if they kept moving they’d still be targets just moving ones. </p><p>          Mother won the argument (she always did) and she died in the early hours insisting it wasn’t her time to go. </p><p>          The music stops — Neil relishes in the peace and quiet — but then it starts again and this time he wakes. But it’s weird, he must not be properly awake yet. He’s woken up inside a dream, he must’ve because the musics playing again. This can’t be real. </p><p>          He sits up roughly, stares at his hands. In dreams you can always find a way to tell whether or not you’re in a dream, hands were his main one. In dreams, your hands always look disfigured, stretched, they have extra fingers or are off colour. </p><p>          One, two, three, for, five. Normal shape, tan colour. Nothing peculiar with his hands. </p><p>          Okay, that’s fine, there’s other ways to tell. He almost falls to the floor in his haste to get off the motel bed and open the curtains. It’s got to be a little past midnight, the sky is dark, but it still looks how it’s meant to look. In dreams, the sky looks more so like a picture, like its been painted or sketched, but this is fine. It’s normal. He slaps himself, the ringing stops. </p><p>          He sighs a breath of relief, the ringing starts up again. </p><p>          “Hello.” His voice cracks and he knows it does. </p><p>          “Is this Nathaniel?”</p><p>           Neil does a full body cringe, the name sending a uncomfortable chill through him, churning in his stomach becoming sticky like taffy. “Yes.”</p><p>          “Hello Nathaniel, it took you a while to answer, are you okay?” </p><p>          “I’m fine.”</p><p>          The herald seems to accept that he’s not going to get much of anything out of this decker, so he continues. “I regret to inform you that sometime in the next twenty four hours you’ll be meeting an untimely death. And while there isn’t anything we can do to suspend that, you still have a chance to live.”</p><p>         Neil knows this off by heart, he’s spent hours reading posts from Deckers, detailing their calls down to the exact words heralds use. Neil’s seen the complaints from people saying that they all read from scripts, that when you’re letting people know that they’re going to die you shouldn’t be so mechanic. He’s read this paragraph, the words the heralds saying, at least twenty times before and that taffy churning in his stomach’s gotten too this and its stuck, still being pulled but it’s not moving anymore, he’s got a dead weight in his abdomen. Neil thinks it’s better they read off of a script, he would hate for them to speak from the heart. </p><p>          Neil can’t believe this, can’t believe it’s happening, maybe he’s more like his mother than he thought because shit, this can’t be legit. Maybe, maybe his dad’s found him, maybe he’s organised this all to scare him. This definitely isn’t The Butchers style but Neil doesn’t want this to be real, he desperately wants this to be fake, wishes he had friends who would play a prank on him, but this isn’t a prank and Neil has no friends. </p><p>          “If you log onto Death-Cast.com and fill out any special requests you may have for your funeral in addition to the inscription you’d like on your headstone. Or perhaps you’d like to be cremated“</p><p>          Neil would rather carry his and his mothers bones on his back for the rest of eternity that be laid to rest in a graveyard with a headstone people pass by. He can imagine it, an underwhelming great lump of stone with one of his names engraved on it. People would pass by it constantly, no one would leave flowers because there is no one to leave him flowers, and that makes his heart ache. What’s he even saying, The Butcher won’t give Neils body a chance to be laid to rest, theres no chance in hell Neil could get a headstone. Fuck. </p><p>          “Nathaniel, on behalf of everyone here at Death-Cast, we are so sorry to lose you. Live this day to the fullest, okay?” Bullshit, he lets the guy hang up first, he didn’t catch the heralds name, maybe he forgot to say it, maybe Neil doesn’t care right now. </p><p>         He’s staring out the window and isn’t sure whether to stand here until the sun rises or if he should pick up all his stuff now and run. He was an hours walk from Columbia, a fifteen minute drive really. He evaluates dying in a car accident and every way you could perish while walking, and that settles it. Neils going to drive to Columbia. </p><p>          (Neil doesn’t currently have a vehicle or a driving license under the name Neil Josten but he was dying in less than twenty three hours and if The Butcher wanted to get him, he was going to have to chase him across Columbia because Neil was damned if he was going to sit and wait to be taken out by that man. Neil had spent his whole life planning where to go with the greatest of caution, being so careful with every step, every bus ride, every car journey, every food shop. But now Neil was going to die and self preservation be fucked he was going to steal a car.)</p>
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